Organize your work: Projects, instructions, memory
Goal. Stop re-explaining yourself. Set up a Project with its own documents and instructions, and let Claude remember the context that keeps coming up — so every chat starts already informed.
Create a project called 'Thesis — methods'. In the project instructions, tell Claude: I'm writing a molecular-biology thesis, prefer British spelling, always ask for the exact statistical test before drafting, and keep explanations PI-level not student-level.
Open Projects in the left sidebar, create one, and add a knowledge base (upload your key papers/protocols) plus project instructions. Every chat inside that project inherits the documents and the instructions automatically.
- 1Make a Project for a recurring body of work. In the sidebar, create a Project, give it a name, and upload the documents it should always know about (papers, a protocol, your draft) into its knowledge base.
- 2Write instructions once. Add project instructions ("prefer British spelling", "explain at PI level", "always cite sources") so you never repeat them. For preferences across all chats, set account-wide Profile Instructions in Settings.
- 3Let memory carry context forward. In Settings → Capabilities, turn on memory: Claude builds a running summary of your role and ongoing work so new chats start informed. Memory can be kept separate per Project, and an incognito chat (the ghost icon) leaves no memory when you want a one-off.
You'll see. A Project where every new chat already knows your documents, your preferences, and your ongoing work — no re-briefing at the start of each conversation.
Cost. Projects, project/profile instructions, and memory are all on the free plan; free accounts get up to 5 Projects, while Pro/Max give unlimited Projects and a much larger knowledge-base capacity. (Searching across all your past chats — Chat Search — is a paid feature.)
Takeaway. Set context once — a Project's documents and instructions plus memory — and Claude stops needing the same briefing every time. Tone and format preferences live in instructions (and in Skills, which now replace the old Styles presets).